Artistic Process

An art student creating a cast drawing in charcoal.

Art Classes – Oil Painting, Drawing and Figure Studies

My artistic process is inspired by extensive academic training in the European tradition of the classical atelier – a traditional art school (or art studio). All a studio art classes I present to my art students involve study from both life and nature and the paintings of the Great Masters. I have a great respect for these painters due to the innovative and creative techniques that appear in their paintings and drawings.

Within my own artistic process, I try to find the basic geometric shapes and proportion of the painting. Then, I block in the shadow shapes, lay in color, and refine. Hue, value, chroma and drawing are all equally important elements. If you neglect one element, you could adversely affect the others.

For a painting to be successful it must remain a cohesive unit. Clarity of thought from inception to completion is a sign of a strong work. I maintain this principle in all my art classes in my atelier.

A painting or drawing is a still moment captured over time. It is the experience of observing the elements of color, tone, shape, and composition. Together, these elements can express the most complicated subjects in the simplest way.

How an Art Student learns in my Atelier

When studying from both nature and life, an art student can train the eye to be perceptive and selective. The student can then produce a work that achieves a tactile reality, sense of dimension, depth, and an acute precision to drawing

The student needs to separate any preconceptions of what they think they see and what they really observe. This concept is paramount to the search for truth. It is an abstract idea to try and not think about what appears on the table and just to see it as an actual physical object.

An aspiring art student tends to evaluate, examine and recognize the patterns of various objects. The student eventually learns to refrain from the naming of objects and to just see them as shapes lit by a light source. Then, the art student begin to better understand the design and composition of a painting.

Creating an Oil Painting in a Painting Class

The act of painting is not to recreate the subject. Rather it is to study the subject and create a visual representation as it relates to this experience.

A painting becomes a pattern of colors and shapes that can produce a profound emotional reaction from the viewer.